The Most Painful

In my life I have been fortunate enough to have a wide variety of injuries, a few of which were very serious, and others not so serious. When I was twelve my appendix burst. Almost exactly one year later I broke my right wrist. My radius (the long bone, on your thumb's side that connects your carpals with your humerus) was broken twice and the ulna (the long bone, on your pinky's side that connects your carpals to your humerus) was broken twice and near my carpals, broke out of my skin. My arm was in a Z-shape with my hand being at the top left of the Z and my elbow being at the bottom right.

I broke my arm the same way most kids my age broke their bones in the past and continue to break bones in the future: skateboarding. I was never that good at skateboarding or even decent; I couldn't even land a kickflip,though once I landed a heelflip, but only once. The day I broke my arm was the same day that my sister had her high school graduation party. During the party I snuck off with some of my friends and ended up skateboarding a few miles away from home.

It's actually kind of embarrassing how I broke my arm. One would like to pontificate and say, "It was my own fault. I shouldn't have grinded that huge rail that nobody else wanted to try. I guess this is the price I pay for being braver than everybody." The reality was that I was grinding a rail that was less than 6'' off the ground and lost my balance and fell backwards and extended both arms to cushion my fall.

I panicked when I got up. My arm was completely limp. I had no idea what I should do. Luckily there were a few adults watching us from their garage. They called an ambulance for me and they also called my mom, who was laid up from her recent hysterectomy.

When the ambulance arrived, the two EMTs didn't bother setting my arm, they just put it in a little cardboard splint and tied it around my neck for support. A few moments after they arrived, my sister and her boyfriend (now husband), Christian, and my mom's boyfriend Tim showed up and took me in my grandfather's old 1984 Ford LTD, white with maroon interior, to the emergency room.

Tim explained my situation to the lady behind the front desk. She instructed us to take a seat. They didn't take my injury too seriously because it was wrapped and I didn't make a sound for a few hours. We were there for four hours and each time I said "Owwww," my mom's boyfriend would instruct me to "not be such a pussy."

I thought I was doing pretty well. I had a compound fracture, broken in four places and all I said was "oww" occasionally. Not to mention the fact that I was thirteen.

When I was finally seen by a doctor, they brought me into the X-ray room in a wheelchair and took a few pictures of it. When they wheeled me out the doctor explained that my arm was "pretty bad" and that it would require surgery.

A few hours later my arm was all put back together and placed inside a hard white container. The worst part was that my summer school started the next day and you were only allowed to miss two days before being kicked out of the summer school program.

I missed two days and returned to school on the third and was actually the first person in my class to complete the course, all the while using my left hand to write.

You might think that this was the most painful thing that ever happened to me. It wasn't. I think I was in shock the whole time and hardly felt anything in my arm.

As a side note, and sort of a continuation of the story of my scar collection, I want to mention something else. When I was around five years old I had a huge rash that was enveloping my entire chest and belly. I almost resembled a burn victim with the red and bloody bumps all over me. My mom took me to doctors, dermatologists, pediatric specialists, etc. and no one could come up with an answer as to what I had.

One day I had a doctor's appointment, that if I knew what I was in for, I wouldn't have went along so easily. My mother and I entered the doctor's office and I took my place on the table with the flimsy paper over it. I took off my shirt as instructed and I noticed that two nurses came into the room. The doctor told me to lay, face up on the table. When I did so the nurses and my mom held me by my arms and legs as the doctor proceeded to cut two bloody red bumps off of my left shoulder.

Despite these two stories, there still exists one more, and far more painful story that I have to tell. A summer afternoon had my friend and me in a field in my home town, investigating an abandoned truck. It looked like all the truck needed was a battery. We disconnected the battery in my '91 Mercury Cougar and walked it over to the truck and connected it. All we succeeded in doing was draining my battery. I called Christian to come out and help jump my car. While we were waiting for him we investigated the lot a little more.

We found a lawn mower which had no wheels. I lifted it up. Dissatisfied, I let it drop. It landed right on my right big toenail. It hurt a little at first. The pain just continued to grow until that night. After I drove Will home I went back home myself, my foot throbbing the entire way. I tried to go to sleep, but the pain kept waking me up. I knew what I had to do. I took a needle from my mom's sewing box and a light I had and closed the door behind me on my way into the bathroom. I fired up the lighter and held it under the needle until I was satisfied that it was good enough. With all my strength I pressed the needle down into my big toenail.

By now my toenail was about to pop off from all the blood that was building up pressure underneath. It was the most intense stabbing pain I have ever had. I tried as hard as I could, but nothing would pierce my toenail. I finally told my mom the next morning that I needed to see a doctor.

She brought me down to the hospital and when the doctor came into the room he told me exactly what he was going to do: "Locally anesthetize and burn a few holes in my big toenail with a cautery." That sounded delightful to me and I couldn't wait to begin. He plugged my toe with a few shots of numbing medicine and asked me "Do you know what a cautery is?" I said "A close group of friends?" (Coterie) and he said "I guess you're right, but not that kind of cautery."

When he brought it out I watched the whole procedure without flinching. It was so great. When my toe was finally numbed I felt so great not having that pain. The doctor quickly burned four or five holes into my toenail and said, "okay, you might want to turn away for this part." I said, "No thank you." He gave me a moment to reconsider and I didn't. He grabbed my toe with his gloved hand and squeezed. The blood flowed out through the holes and it felt fantastic. All the pressure cleared out from under my toenail and I felt great again.

Later on that night I pulled my toenail off with some pliers. I just had to soak my foot in warm water and epsom salt each night. In time I developed an ingrown toenail. I went back to the hospital to get it fixed, but that really didn't do anything for me. Since then my wife fixed it for me.